


The Things You Do For Love

by mirawonderfulstar



Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: 5 Times, Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Protective Spock, Tropey Tropes and Cliche Cliches, everyone has a martyr complex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-28
Updated: 2017-11-28
Packaged: 2019-02-07 22:19:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12850683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mirawonderfulstar/pseuds/mirawonderfulstar
Summary: "Some things you'll do for money, and some you'll do for fun, but the things you do for love are gonna come back to you one by one." Or, five times McCoy saved Spock’s life.





	The Things You Do For Love

**Author's Note:**

> The title and summary come from "Love, Love, Love" by The Mountain Goats. This could technically be mcspirk but since it's mostly focused on the relationship between Spock and McCoy that's what it's tagged as.

Spock and McCoy are fiercest rivals, anybody who has watched them interact can tell you that. What exactly they’re competing over, McCoy doesn’t know. Prestige, maybe- they’re both the most capable in their fields and have the rank and talent to prove it. Maybe it’s their disparate approaches to life, a challenge to prove whose way of thinking is best. A small part of McCoy doesn't want to acknowledge that it's probably something more childish than that, more instinctual, like a desire to impress Jim. He knows that’s not really necessary, of course- Jim values both of them as professionals and as friends and there’s no need for them to impress him- but he’s not always sure that those parts of Spock and himself that they keep so well buried know that. He knows, because he knows Spock, that deep down there’s a part of them both that’s a little bit competitive over Jim, no matter how they might rationally know it’s unnecessary.

But that doesn’t mean Spock's behavior doesn’t get to him, sometimes. Every once in a while there’s a preventable, reckless injury or some sort of self-sacrificing melodrama on his part that sparks up a rage in McCoy. Knowing where it comes from and being able to relate doesn’t make it any less irritating when the fool goes and throws his life on the line and puts McCoy through the trouble of patching him back up afterwards. If he had more time to think about it, that rage might mean a lot more to McCoy, but between away missions that end in bloodshed and diplomatic ordeals that somehow seem to always do the same, he _doesn’t_ have the time. It sits in the back of his mind, a small glowing coal of… something, unquestioned.

It takes McCoy a long, long time to start questioning it.

The first time comes when Spock jerks awake in the sickbay one night after some life-threatening stunt on Toras. McCoy looks up from his paperwork at the sudden change in monitor readings and narrows his eyes. He rises from his chair, setting down the charts he’d been looking over, and swoops towards Spock’s bed, preparing to lean down and give him a very angry lecture about the dangers of basically jumping off cliffs and the limits of even Vulcan physiology. He opens his mouth, face already screwed up in annoyance, and is caught off guard by the look in Spock’s eyes.

“Something the matter, Mr Spock?” he snaps, straightening back up and folding his hands behind his back. Spock regards him carefully for several moments, and McCoy continues to glare, bobbing on the balls of his feet. “Well?” he prompts after nearly a minute.

“I am merely surprised to see you, doctor. After the events of the day I would have expected you to be in your own quarters, not in sickbay, regardless of my condition.”

McCoy blinks at him. “You’ve been out for nearly a week. Everyone else has recovered, but trying to leap across a massive gap and falling three hundred feet into a chasm really did a number on you.” He suddenly remembers that he’s angry about this, and raises a finger threateningly. “If you ever even _think_ about doing that again, you can rest assured it's not gonna be me who spends fourteen hours in surgery patching you up.”

“Fascinating. I would not have guessed it would take fourteen hours to fully repair a body that had fallen that distance. I’m surprised you could do it at all.”

“I very nearly couldn’t, so a simple thank you wouldn’t go amiss.” McCoy huffs. “You selfish, thickheaded Vulcan.”

“Thank you, Doctor McCoy.” Spock says quietly. McCoy flaps his hand at him and turns towards the comm system on the wall.

“I should call Jim, he’ll be thrilled to hear you’re awake and giving me a hard time again.”

“I would appreciate that.” Spock says, and McCoy just grumbles in response. He’s still mad but the tone of it has shifted slightly, softened somehow not by Spock’s regaining consciousness, but by his initial assumption that it was still the night of his injury. McCoy can’t put his finger on why, but the idea that Spock thought he’d been in sickbay this late at night to keep watch over him rather than the truth (that he’d stayed late to do paperwork after a very long day of non-Spock-related problems) irritates him almost as much as the Vulcan’s foolhardiness. Except it’s not necessarily irritation, or maybe it’s not irritation at Spock. It’s some other feeling. It’s confusing, whatever it is, and McCoy is startled by it.

The whole thing has blown over in the next day or so. Spock gets back on his feet, Jim is pleased to have him back on the bridge, McCoy and Spock go back to arguing and away missions go back to being, well, away missions. McCoy doesn’t think about That Way He Felt About Spock for a long time.

And then a similar thing happens again. The three of them, Jim, Spock, and McCoy, beam down to a planet with unusual life forms in the ocean, given the age of the planet and what evolutionary scientists believe about planetary development. It’s a peaceful enough place, quiet, sedate. McCoy loves it, actually. Almost as soon as they’ve gotten there he’s asking Jim about bringing the crew down for shore leave later. Jim is all for it, but Spock points out that it would be more prudent to find out what the unusual life form readings indicated before allowing anyone else to come to the surface.

“I suppose that’s logical.” McCoy grumbles. “Try and find whatever it is you’re looking for quickly, though, I know several people onboard would be thrilled to spend a day on the beach and who aren’t going to be happy to stay in orbit while we have all the fun down here.”

“Doctor,” Spock begins, obviously annoyed as the trio begin to walk along the shore so Spock can scan the surface of the water. “Regardless of what the crew wants, the chance there is something dangerous in the water here is too great to rush them down. You should know this, as you have a responsibility to the well-being of-“

“Oh, shut up, Spock.” McCoy says easily. Jim looks from one to the other and chuckles when he sees good humor on both of their faces. Spock glances at Jim and then shoots McCoy a look that McCoy is tempted to think of as “fond”. It surprises him so much he stumbles in the sand, losing his balance and putting his foot down in the surf by accident.

His muttered swear is drown out by the first officer’s shout of “look out!” as something rises from the water about thirty feet out. An enormous tentacle, thick and glowing faintly, emerges and stretches, quick as a flash, towards land. McCoy stumbles back out of the water, and Jim grabs him by the arm as the two fall backward in the sand, landing on their bums and watching in horror as the thing reaches for them.

Spock steps in front of the thing, firing his phaser as it closes on him. It wraps around him and he lets out a sharp cry as he drops his weapon and is sucked into the surf.

“Spock!” Jim yells, and shoots the thing with his own phaser. It doesn’t seem to have any effect on the glowing slimy mass apart from forcing it to pull Spock back out into the water a little more slowly. McCoy joins him and they fire on the same point and finally, after several seconds of concentrated fire, the thing lets Spock go and slithers away back to the depths it came from.

“Thank god.” McCoy murmurs, and Jim nods vigorously.

“Spock, are you alright? Can you swim back in?” he calls.

Spock’s head raises a little further above water for a brief moment, and he looks about to call back, but then he slips under the surface.

“Damn.” McCoy grumbles, not stopping to think as he yanks off his boots and runs out into the water.

Spock isn’t very far out, but there’s a strong riptide that’s pulling him south and away from the shore, and contact with the tentacle of the thing seems to have weakened him. McCoy runs until it’s too deep to do so, then dives into the chilly water and swims to Spock, who’s spluttering on the salt water when McCoy reaches him.

“Come on, Spock.” McCoy gasps. “I’ve got you.”

He pulls Spock back to shore and drags him up onto the sand, where they lie for a moment, shivering against the cold of the water. McCoy tightens his grip around Spock’s shoulders as he coughs and glances down the beach at Jim, who’s running to meet them. “Maybe you were right about this being a dangerous place for shore leave.” Spock coughs again. “You alright?”

“As I will ever be in your care.” Spock quips, and McCoy grins as he rubs a hand along Spock’s soaked shirtsleeve, the same emotion he’d felt at the idea of Spock thinking he’d been keeping an eye on him igniting once again.

McCoy reflects on it as Jim arrives and pulls them both to their feet and they hail the ship to beam them up. Protectiveness? That’s only natural, he supposes. Spock had been right, McCoy is technically responsible for the well-being of everyone onboard ship in his capacity as a doctor and god knows he’s even more invested in Spock and Jim. He’s closer to them than to any other people he’s ever met in his life, of course he feels protective of Spock when something bad happens to him.

Somehow he suspects that’s not all there is to it but he doesn't want to dwell on what else it might be.

The next new information McCoy gets on this topic comes to him after a long and painful ordeal on New Vega. It starts as a diplomatic mission- the Vegans want to be a part of the federation and offer to let the landing party test out the technology they’re bringing to the table. None of them realize until it’s too late that a rogue group trying to sabotage the affair have infiltrated the meeting and redirected the technology for their own aims.

The technology in question is an enhancement to the Vegans’ telepathic capabilities. It allows those with well developed telepathy to temporarily loan the power to those with more limited skills in the area. Spock seems very eager to try it out and asks McCoy to join him, to McCoy’s surprise and discomfort.

“It has been my experience that humans with high levels of empathy such as yourself, doctor, are generally better equipped to handle telepathic connections. I request your assistance in testing the Vegans’ invention.” Spock says to him in the evening, after the landing party comprising the two of them and the captain have been shown to some very nice accommodations in the planet’s capital city. McCoy stares at Spock, standing in the doorframe connecting McCoy’s bedroom with the central living space the three men are sharing for the duration of their visit to the planet.

“Nothing against you, Spock, but I don’t know if I trust a piece of machinery to poke around in my head.” McCoy says after several moments, clasping his hands behind him. Spock lets out a small sigh.

“The device is merely a conduit. The telepathy itself would be an extension of my own telepathy.”

“I don’t know that I want to read anybody’s mind in any case!” McCoy snaps. Jim lets out a chuckle from the living area where he’s lounging on a low couch.

“It’s only me who’s mind you’d be reading. Come on, Bones, it’s perfectly safe. We saw the Vegan scientists test it out themselves earlier today.” They had indeed, and McCoy had found it vaguely unsettling then, as well. Telepathy in general just isn’t for him, he decides, and says so. Jim shrugs.

“I suppose you’re stuck with me then, Mr Spock.” Jim says, giving Spock his best charming smile. Spock stands up a little straighter, an almost apprehensive look in his eyes.

“Captain, I don’t believe I expressed myself properly earlier. It _must_ be the doctor. I know your minds, both of you, and Doctor McCoy’s is better suited to this than your own.”

Hurt flashes briefly across Jim’s face, but then he smiles again and turns expectantly to McCoy. McCoy wants to apologize for whatever it is that has made him the better option, because he knows how sensitive Jim can be about feeling rejected and how much he cares about Spock. But before he can do so, Spock is prompting him to reconsider, and McCoy flings his hands in the air and complies. He doesn’t need telepathy to read Jim Kirk and he doesn’t relish the prospect of Spock seeing more of him than usual but in the interests of diplomacy he complies.

Spock fits a band of thin metals and fine crystals, almost like a delicate crown, around his head, then steps back and closes his eyes. McCoy’s thoughts linger for a moment on the feeling of Spock’s fingers brushing against his hair before he immediately forces them away.

He needn’t have worried. Spock stands still and quiet for nearly a minute before opening his eyes and cocking his head at McCoy.

“Do you feel anything?”

“Other than a bit silly? No.”

Spock looks troubled. Jim frowns and gets up from his couch, crossing his arms.

“Try again.”

Spock closes his eyes again. The three are silent, McCoy and Jim looking from Spock to each other.

“Maybe you need to initiate a meld? You did say it utilizes your own telepathic abilities.” McCoy suggests. Spock nods, taking a step toward McCoy, but before he can raise his hands McCoy catches his wrist.

“I think… something’s happening.” McCoy says softly. A prickling sensation in the back of his consciousness, like he’s being watched but not quite the same. And something like an echo or a memory resurfacing, except this thought had never come from him… McCoy looks at Jim, eyebrows raised, and he _knows_ something in that moment, but before he can fully articulate it to himself Spock is coming at him, his fists raised.

Spock hits him, hard, in the face, and McCoy stumbles back.

“Spock! What the hell are you doing?!” Jim shouts, rushing forward to intervene, but with one swift nerve pinch Jim collapses. McCoy straightens up again, his teeth bared.

“Why did you do that?” he hisses, rubbing at his jaw, where blood from his split lip is sticky and wet on his skin.

Spock doesn’t reply, but instead hits McCoy again, catching his ear which begins to ring. McCoy reaches for the phaser on his belt before remembering that it’s on his bedside table back in the bedroom of their hosts.

Spock grabs him and pushes him against the wall, and a thrill of horror and something else goes through McCoy as he flashes back to a similar occurrence happening with another Spock in another universe. But this time Spock’s hand doesn’t go to his temple. It goes to his throat, and McCoy chokes and splutters as Spock's grip tightens on his windpipe.

“Spock...!” he gasps. Spock pays him no mind. His expression is one of complete rage, a look McCoy’s only seen there one or two times before, and it’s this more than anything else that makes McCoy close his eyes and concentrate on the sensations coursing through him, channeled by the Vegans’ device.

It takes a great deal more concentration than he really has patience for at this moment, but McCoy manages to isolate the feelings coming from Spock as separate from the feelings coming from himself, and he finds he’s able to influence them with his mind. If he can just… but he’s starting to lose consciousness. Another couple of seconds and there won’t be enough oxygen getting to his brain to do any thinking at all.

With the last of his strength, McCoy reaches up a scrabbling hand and pushes the device off his head before lapsing into unconsciousness.

When he comes to it’s to find Jim settled on the floor and staring at him from his new position on the low couch.

“Bones, thank god.” Jim says with a great breath of relief. “Spock said you’d be alright but I was worried we’d lost you.”

“What in the devil happened, and where _is_ Spock?” McCoy snaps, then coughs. His throat is very hoarse. 

He’s in his room taking apart that headpiece.” Jim says, jerking his head to indicate the room behind him. “He’s not sure how but he says its been tampered with to create a feedback loop that’ll cause debilitating pain and insanity in the telepath trying to use the device. You saved his life as well as your own in taking it off when you did.”

McCoy coughs again. “Good for me.”

Jim pats his shoulder, stopping him from trying to get up. “Stay there and rest a moment, you look awful. I’ll get you some water.”

As Jim stands up and crosses to the bathroom and out of sight, McCoy’s thoughts are drawn back to the thing he’d sensed from Jim before Spock had hit him the first time. It had been… gratification. Satisfaction brought on by seeing Spock and McCoy standing so close, seeing McCoy holding Spock by the wrist the way he had done. Tinged with jealousy, yes, and sadness, a bit of loneliness, feeling like he was being left out, but overwhelmingly, a feeling of correctness and goodness and- McCoy swallows, his throat sore- _love_.

McCoy doesn’t know what to do with the information that Jim Kirk, his best friend in the universe, thinks that he and Spock look good together, or that Jim feels a bit inferior in the face of it, so he takes the glass of water Jim offers him and thinks about other things. He’ll worry when it becomes relevant but for the time being he just wants to get back on his feet and go home to the ship.

It becomes relevant again much sooner than McCoy would have hoped. Barely two weeks go by before he and Spock end up in another life-threatening situation together. Spock, McCoy, a geological expert named Roberts, and a pair of security personnel beam down to Abraxa, a planet inhabited by primitive humanoid life still in their Stone Age. The mission is to take some samples, conduct some surveys, and stay out of the locals’ way.

Of course, this last part spectacularly backfires when Roberts manages to fall down a hill and get herself badly injured, and the rest of the party, in their haste to get to her, fail to realize that the clearing below the hill is situated right at the mouth of a massive system of caves. They’re attacked by the Abraxans as they attempt to rescue Roberts. They manage to fight them off, but not before they’ve taken Roberts and retreated back into their caves. The security team goes after her while Spock hails the ship, and Jim advises them to get Roberts back but to proceed with caution.

By the time the sun is setting on Abraxa, the security team are dead, Spock has sustained a large cut to his arm, and a violent storm has forced Spock and McCoy to seek shelter in the same caves as the Abraxans. They build a small fire out of moss and dry brush in a cavern far enough back from the entrance as to avoid the worst of the weather. Spock’s readings indicate that the cave system is extensive, over ten kilometers of ground to cover. Finding Roberts alive and well, nearly six hours after her fall and in unfamiliar terrain, is incredibly unlikely, and McCoy is very unhappy about it.

“We can’t just leave her behind!” McCoy insists, pacing around the small cavern with his arms crossed. 

“Nor can we investigate any further in our present state.” Spock says patiently. “The possibility of us becoming lost is too great. The most logical course of action is to wait until the storm subsides, then call the captain for reinforcements, including, perhaps, a ball of thread.” He settles down against the cave wall with a wince.

“Was that supposed to be a joke?” McCoy says with a raised eyebrow.

“Yes.” Spock says, raising his right back. “The Earth myth of the labyrinth-“

“I know what you were referencing, you green-blooded…” McCoy grumbles, his words trailing off into nothing as his frustration simmers inside him.

“Then you should know that our situation is similarly futile. We are at an extreme disadvantage in trying to navigate these caves, as our enemy’s knowledge of their layout is superior to our own.”

“All the same, I’m a doctor, and I’ll be damned if I just give up on somebody and leave her to die or who knows what else at the hands of the Abraxans.”

“Fortunately for us both, I am the commanding officer, and what we do is my decision to make. I order you to sit down and sleep. I’ll take the first watch.”

“That’s low even for you, Spock.” McCoy says, but obeys. He settles against the wall farthest from Spock and curls in on himself, willing out the chill as he closes his eyes. “Wake me in four hours.”

“I will.”

He doesn’t. McCoy wakes up in the early hours of the morning to find their small fire has burned itself out and the storm is still raging outside, and there is nothing but a smear of blood from Spock’s injured arm where the first officer had been sitting. McCoy swears as he stands up, shaking out the cold and the pain in his back from sleeping six hours on a cold stone floor. He runs the tricorder over the blood stain, then makes a quick circle of the room, listening for the telltale noise of the machine in his hand. It leads him to a tunnel leading away from the mouth of the cave. In an instant he’s made up his mind, and he pulls out his phaser for light before he heads out into the network of tunnels, his tricorder in one hand and the phaser in the other.

That utter and complete moron. That reckless, stubborn, pigheaded fool. McCoy’s own blood pounds in his ears as he thinks about Spock using his to navigate himself through a dark and dangerous series of caves after tricking McCoy. When he gets his hands on Spock, he’s going to absolutely kill him, if only for the split second of heart-stopping panic McCoy endured upon waking up and finding himself alone in the cavern.

McCoy makes his way down the middle tunnel, then takes a right, following the occasional miniscule smear of Vulcan blood on the walls of the caves as he goes, praising Spock for his ingenuity even as he curses at him. Why the idiot hadn’t woken him up before leaving, McCoy doesn’t know, but he’ll be giving Spock an earful about that when he finds him.

After fifteen very long minutes of wandering through caves, following Spock’s trail of breadcrumbs from the open wound on his arm, McCoy hears a decidedly feminine scream. He breaks into a run, stumbling over the uneven ground as he takes a left, a right, another right towards the source of the sound. He emerges into a small cavern, where he finds Roberts with her leg in a crudely made splint and with a number of gashes on her face, but otherwise looking none the worse for wear.

“Doctor, thank goodness! The Abraxans splinted my leg, but then they just left me here, and I had my phaser for light until about an hour ago when the charge gave out, and I thought I heard noises in the dark.” She shudders, and McCoy gives her a hug as he helps her to her feet.

“It’s alright, Roberts, we’ll get you back to the ship. Have you seen Spock?”

“No, but like I said, I heard a noise a moment ago.”

“What kind of a noise?”

Roberts shrugs as she leans against McCoy. “I don’t know, a rock crumbling kind of noise? It came from that direction.” She points down a tunnel and McCoy pulls out his tricorder to scan for Spock’s blood as they walk forward together. There’s nothing on the tricorder but as they round a corner they nearly trip over Spock himself, who is lying in a heap on the ground. McCoy purses his lips as he kneels down and pulls out his medical kit.

“Doctor McCoy.” Spock murmurs as McCoy cradles his head in his lap and sticks a hypospray in his neck before beginning the process of examining the wound on his arm.

“Be quiet, Spock.” McCoy says in a deadly whisper as he cleans the arm and puts a small skin patch over it. They’ll have to wait to get back to the ship for him to use the dermal regenerator but the patch should do for now. “What was going through your head that you thought wandering off alone and using your own blood to lead me to you was a good idea?”

“I knew that if we were to search for Roberts together you would insist we split up. The risk of one of us getting lost and the time that would add to the investigation made it logical for me to go alone. The blood was for myself, to find my own way back. I intended to return before you awoke.”

Spock tries to sit up, but McCoy shoves his head back into his lap. “I’m not done with your arm, stay put.” Spock sighs. “You didn’t even find Roberts, I did. You fainted on the way to her. Overall, I’d say this was one of your worse plans, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Yes, doctor.” Spock says tonelessly. McCoy snorts and gives him a stimulant before standing and pulling Spock to his feet. “Don’t you ever disappear like that on me again, you hear?”

“Yes, doctor.” Spock repeats, and McCoy nods before holding out an arm for Roberts to resume leaning on him, and the three follow the tricorder readings of Spock’s blood back out of the cave.

McCoy thinks about this incident for a long time afterwards, about his initial reaction to finding himself alone in the dark. How much of that feeling is instinctual, the human fear of the unknown that everyone shares, and how much of it is the sense of betrayal that Spock would leave him, abandon him in a strange place? McCoy isn’t sure but he does know that if it’d been Jim there instead of Spock and Jim had made the same choice, McCoy would have rationalized it. With Spock, though, there’s just this burning sense of hurt about the decision that doesn’t fade with time.

Maybe it’s that hurt that causes McCoy to do what he does on Epsilon III, or maybe he’s just had enough of whatever this thing between him and Spock is. Maybe he wants to prove something, although he couldn’t say what it might be.

Epsilon III has been in the middle of a civil war for the last ten years when the Enterprise arrives. They’re fighting over technology; one side feels that the other has kept advancements from them intentionally, to keep them subjugated. The other side feels that they’re right to refuse to share because their enemy has always been bellicose and volatile. The landing party is taken captive almost immediately upon arriving, and Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are assumed to be spies from the more technologically advanced side. The three are interrogated, tortured, and eventually sent to die in the wasteland that makes up much of the battlefront.

Their captors arm them with weapons- guns and explosives and vests that almost but not quite protect them from projectiles- and they drop them in the midst of their war. None of them want to fight, none of them _intend_ to fight, but when bullets start flying and Jim goes down, Spock snaps.

He climbs up out of the trench the trio had been crouching in, ignoring McCoy’s shouts, and starts making his way towards the other side. He flings a grenade and McCoy watches in horror as a small group of strangers on the other side is obliterated. He makes it almost to the front of their line before he is hit, and McCoy, horrorstruck, jumps up from where he’s been tending to Jim and flings himself into the fray.

He somehow manages to avoid any serious injury as he makes his way to Spock. Spock, who is choking on his own blood, lying in the dirt. McCoy gathers Spock to him, holding him in trembling arms, and desperately searches his pockets for his medical kit before remembering he’d used the meager supplies their captors had provided to tend to Jim. McCoy shakes his head desperately, looking from Spock’s face to the people thirty feet away firing weapons at them.

“Doctor McCoy,” Spock begins, raising a hand to touch McCoy’s face, and McCoy realizes he is crying. Spock's fingers come away wet. 

“Shut up, Spock.” He murmurs, leaning down and burying his face in Spock’s chest.

“Please go back. You must save the captain.” Spock gasps. Small flecks of blood hit McCoy’s face as Spock talks. 

“I’m not leaving you here.” McCoy growls. “So just shut up.” He holds Spock tighter, trying to block out the world around them.

“Leonard-“ Spock begins, but before he can say anything more there is a massive explosion as a grenade goes off beside them, and then nothing but the dark.

 

McCoy opens his eyes and immediately wishes he hadn’t. The light above him is so bright it feels like somebody is firing a phaser directly into his skull. He closes his eyes again and instead focuses on listening. The biobed is beeping. There’s the usual sounds of the ship underway, the familiar hum and whir and from the other room the clink of glass in the lab. He can also hear Jim and Christine conversing in low voices.

“Christine?” He croaks, and the voices stop. The pair rush to his bed, and he squints up at them.

“Doctor McCoy, what good timing.” Christine says with a smile. “The captain’s here to check up on you.”

“Hey, Jim.” McCoy says, turning to look at Jim, who beams so widely it looks painful, clasping McCoy’s hand in both his own.

“It’s good to see you aren’t dead.” McCoy says, and Jim’s smile fades a little.

“I wasn’t very badly injured. It was skin deep.” Jim squeezes McCoy’s hand. “Spock, however…”

McCoy’s heartbeat stutters. “What about Spock?”

Jim looks over at the bed behind McCoy’s and McCoy follows his gaze to see Spock, fast asleep, his chest still bandaged. He takes a deep breath, willing himself to relax, and glares at Jim.

“He’s going to live?”

“Christine says he’ll be fine in a few days but it was a close thing. He was already badly injured when the grenade went off, if you hadn’t been there and taken the brunt of the explosion…”

McCoy leans back in bed, staring at the ceiling. “How did we get out?”

“Sulu had been searching for us since we failed to check in when we first beamed down. He eventually located us based on coordinates Mr Scott, ah, extracted from the head of their militia. They beamed us up right after the explosion.”

McCoy nods, his eyes still closed. “Bones…” Jim says, and he cracks one eye open again. “Bones, I’ve been meaning to talk to you.”

“About what?”

“You know damn well what.” Jim says in his _I don’t have time for this_ voice. McCoy does in fact know what. He sits up a little, completely at a loss for what to say.

“I don’t know, Jim. I think… somewhere along the line, it just happened. I know you’re not happy about it, but-“

“Not happy? What gave you that idea?” Jim sounds completely flabbergasted, and McCoy can’t help but smile a little.

“That whole telepathy tech fiasco. I could tell you felt… well… excluded.”

“Captain.” Spock’s voice comes from the other bed, and McCoy and Jim both turn to look at him. Jim rushes to his side.

“Glad to see you awake and well, Mr Spock.” Jim says with another wide grin. Spock gives him his own kind of smile back. “We’ve been worried.”

“I wasn’t.” McCoy grumbles, but he too is smiling. Spock raises an eyebrow at him.

“Doctor McCoy. I would advise you not to do anything so foolish again but I doubt very much you’d listen.”

“How do you like that, coming from the man whose life I’ve had to save more times than I can count.” McCoy says with a grin, looking at Jim who grins right back. “You’re absolutely right, Spock, I wouldn’t listen. We’re stuck with each other and all our irritating quirks, I think, and that includes saving each other’s lives at the risk of our own.”

Spock gives McCoy a long, searching look, then looks back up at Jim. “I’m glad to see you were not seriously injured, Captain.”

“And I’m glad to see you two well enough to bicker.” Jim says, sounding very happy. “I’ll leave you alone for a while, I should get back to the bridge.” He makes to leave the room, but Spock catches his hand.

“Jim, I don’t think you ever need to worry about being the odd one out among us.” McCoy says, and Jim blushes very faintly and clears his throat.

“Yes, well-“

“I believe what the doctor is trying to say is that we both have as great an affection for you as we do for each other.” Spock says. McCoy tilts his head and smiles, looking from Spock to Jim and back again.

“I love you, too, Spock, and Jim as well.”

Jim shakes his head, chuckling. “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, you should be resting, and I should get back to work. I hope to see you both back on your feet soon, it’s a bit lonely on the bridge and on away missions without the pair of you.”

“Yes, captain.” Spock says, raising an eyebrow at McCoy. McCoy laughs and raises his right back before turning to watch Jim head out of the room. The competition hadn't been over Jim, after all. 


End file.
